Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Running Mac OS 10.7.3 - Firefox 11.0. I can't delete my browsing history. When I go to Tools > Clear Recent History, nothing seems to happen. Going into Preferences > Privacy & tweaking the options there does not work either.

  • 3 replies
  • 5 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

more options

Running Mac OS 10.7.3. Firefox 11.0 for Mac. Tools > Clear Recent History..., nothing seems to happen - does not remove browsing history. No separate window for selecting recent history appears. Preferences > Privacy and tweaking the options there does not work either.

Running Mac OS 10.7.3. Firefox 11.0 for Mac. Tools > Clear Recent History..., nothing seems to happen - does not remove browsing history. No separate window for selecting recent history appears. Preferences > Privacy and tweaking the options there does not work either.

All Replies (3)

more options

Make sure that you do not run Firefox in permanent Private Browsing mode.

To see all History and Cookie settings, choose:

  • Firefox > Preferences > Privacy, choose the setting Firefox will: Use custom settings for history
  • Deselect: [ ] "Always use private browsing mode"
more options

I am not running Firefox is Private Browsing mode. The window that had popped up in previous versions of Firefox when I selected "Clear Recent History" does not appear. My preferences from previous versions of Firefox have not changed upon updating to Firefox 11.0.

more options

Is that menu entry enabled (not grayed out)?


Try to repair the disk permissions:

Try to remove the Firefox plist file (org.mozilla.firefox.plist).

Go to "~/Library/Preferences" and remove the plist file for Firefox (org.mozilla.firefox.plist)


Create a new profile as a test to check if your current profile is causing the problems.

See "Basic Troubleshooting: Make a new profile":

There may be extensions and plugins installed by default in a new profile, so check that in "Tools > Add-ons > Extensions & Plugins" in case there are still problems.

If that new profile works then you can transfer some files from the old profile to that new profile, but be careful not to copy corrupted files.

See: